iPod Small Talk: when the Small becomes Big

by Frank Hedley  |  April 20, 2009

The newest iPod shuffle saw daylight a month ago, on 9 March, 2009 and continues to mesmerize the world with how much a small thing can do. The “Small Talk” is part of the 3rd generation of the iPod shuffle family, but its features surpass the abilities of any of its relatives.

The most noticeable improvement is in dimensions. With a height of 1.8 inches, a width of 0.7 inches, a depth of 0.3 inches and a weight of 0.38 ounces the newest iPod is in fact the world's smallest music player, and I may add that also the lightest.

These performances were achieved because all the main buttons were transferred from the iPod body to the right earphone cord. As a result, on the earphone cord there are positioned 3 buttons: the volume plus button, the central button and the volume minus button. Of course, that the volume plus and minus buttons are made to adjust the volume of a song while the central button has several functions: one click will start playing the music, a consecutive click will pause the music, two clicks will skip a song.

If we now know from where the word “Small” comes, it remains to explain from where it takes the “Talk “ attribute. Another big improvement which separates the newest iPod from the crowd of music players, is the VoiceOver feature. The feature uses the same Voice over technology met at the Mac OS X systems and is able to tell the song title, the artist and even the playlists in 14 different languages, much similar to a  personal announcer. The button responsible for the VoiceOver is the same center button. One needs to press and hold the center button in order to activate the VoiceOver feature – practically the iPod will tell you the name and title of the song and artist. Continue holding, and the iPod will read through the playlist, without stopping the music.

Having an impressive memory capacity of 4GB the “Small Talk” iPod can hold up to 1000 songs. Multiple playlists in iTunes for every mood and occasion are also supported by the small, but brave device.

Made of aluminum and provided with a clip, the “Small Talk” has a minimalist design, available in 2 colors: black and silver. Moreover, the accessories available for the world smallest iPod are four basic ones: in – ear headphones with remote and mic, earphones with remote and mic, USB power adapter and an USB cable.

All the above features qualify the “Small Talk” iPod as a technological novelty and as a surprise on the entertainment market. For such a small gadget, the newest iPod displays an impressive feature set, ready to compete with any “big” music player.

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